Smiling, as he knew he’d piqued my interest, Ethan began to list off the names one by one. “Well, you know Gavin,” he slowly began. “He’s the youngest of the group and just left Alaska to learn what it’s like living outside Cascia House for the first time since he was ten.”
I didn’t say anything, as I’d already made my point where he was concerned.
“Next, there’s Stark. Like Flint, he’s in the military. Unlike Flint, he doesn’t act like a prick and never has to be told to shut up. I mean, the man hardly speaks. Also, he and Flint don’t get along very well, so they need a buffer between them to keep them from fighting.”
I smiled at his very blunt description of Flint and Stark’s turbulent relationship. “Why don’t they get along?”
Ethan sighed. “Not sure. I think their personalities just rub each other the wrong way. Also, they bunked together during their stay at Cascia House, so I think there’s some water under the bridge there that they’ve been harboring for some time and simply don’t want to discuss.”
“Interesting,” I said, wondering how I could weaponize this knowledge the next time Flint pissed me off.
“The buffer between the two men that I mentioned is Colt. That man gets along with everyone, when he’s not exploring the world solo. He’s a wildlife expert who leads groups of people into nature’s most dangerous places both domestically and abroad.”
That sounded awfully dangerous. In fact, it seemed all of these men had an eye for both adventure and danger in their lives. Even though Ethan was in finance, the entire time I’d known him he’d been jumping out of planes, going on big-game hunting trips, and deep-sea diving all over the world. Like many men, the Cascia House boys liked the great outdoors. Like most wares, apparently, they liked those great outdoors to be down and dirty, dangerous and rough.
“Is that it?” I prompted.
“It might be,” Ethan hedged. “I’m still waiting on one more person to call me back. My brother Logan.”
As he said his brother’s name, Ethan’s face kind of went blank.
“Who’s Logan?” I gently queried, wanting to know why he was being so evasive right now.
“My brother,” Ethan repeated, before glancing my way. “My blood brother,” he clarified after a moment of silence.
CHAPTER 9
Ethan
The look on Millie’s face was a mix of surprise and confusion.
“I didn’t know you had a brother,” she spoke, her hand reaching out and softly touching my arm.
I didn’t talk about Logan much. He was older than me and had never lived at Cascia House. Not that Laurence hadn’t offered him a place to stay. Of course he had. But Logan hated the very idea of the group home and ran away every chance he got. After a while, Laurence stopped looking for him. There’s only so much you can do to keep someone in your life. If they don’t want to be there, you can’t trap them or force them to stay, especially not a ware. Laurence liked to say he was the one boy he could never reach. I liked to say my brother was an asshole. But, hey, potato, potato. Right?
“He’s my older brother,” I coldly explained. “He was seventeen when my parents died, and he hated the idea of living at the group home. No matter how much Laurence tried to welcome him in, attempted to bring him into the fold, my brother rejected the help. Eventually, he disappeared into the Alaskan wilderness and I didn’t see him for over a decade.”
“That’s terrible,” Millie sympathized, as I threaded my fingers through hers.
“It was. Growing up, I’d idolized my older brother. When my parents died, he was all the family I had left. Then he disappeared without so much as a goodbye, and it felt like I was grieving their loss all over again.”
Millie’s beautiful blue eyes filled with tears. “I’m so sorry, Ethan. That must have been just awful for you. Were you ever able to ask him why he left?”
I shrugged. “By the time I saw him again, it no longer mattered. The damage had been done, and I’d stopped caring. Laurence had filled the void Logan had left behind.”
Millie bit her bottom lip in a clear attempt to keep her thoughts to herself. “Thank you for sharing that with me, Ethan. I know it must have been hard.”
Though she may be young, Millie, like all of us in my strange not-a-pack, was no stranger to loss. In her short years, she’d mourned both her parents’ deaths and had to pick up the pieces of her shattered life without any other support. Of course, I’d always been there, but I’d stayed in the shadows, watching over her from afar.
Millie hadn’t known about my involvement. She’d been unaware that I’d been in charge of her estate before she’d turned eighteen. Calvin had tasked me in his will with hersafekeeping in the event of his passing. I couldn’t make myself visible in Millie’s life because we’d feared it would draw the wrong kind of attention to her with other shifters. So, painful as it might have been, I’d watched from a distance.
But Calvin had always worried about the Tupilaq pack catching wind of her existence one day, a nagging fear he’d held since she was born. Millie’s father had foreseen the pack would try to take her back to Alaska to add to their “brood” of omegas. Now, that was my fear as well.
When we pulled up to the cabin, I could see that the living room lights were all on. That must mean everyone had arrived. Everyone but Logan. Hell, calling him had been a long shot at best. I don’t even know why I’d bothered. He’d never been there for me in the past. Why would I expect that to change when it concerned my mate?
Coming through the front door took me back to another time and place. The lively hustle and bustle of the men inside reminded me of my days at Cascia House, a home that had hosted both the best and worst memories of my formative years.
The minute we stepped into the house, Flint tossed me a beer and I caught it in my outstretched hand.
